GIMPO – People curious about North Korea can now get a peek at life inside the famously reclusive country while lingering over a cup of coffee.
A 40-seater Starbucks cafe opened last week at South Korea’s Aegibong Peace Ecopark in Gimpo city, which is along the divide between the two Koreas and just a river apart from the North.
The cafe’s location allows visitors an unfettered view of a small village in North Korea’s Gaepung county just 1.4km away, so near the number of buildings in the village can be counted.
The North Korean village houses some 20 three-storey high buildings that look like residences, with a single-storey building that looks like a school, a plaza and rice fields near the riverbank.
Telescopes on the observatory terrace outside the cafe, which offer 100x zoom capabilities, allow for an even closer peek. A Gimpo official jokes that “you can almost make eye contact with the villagers”.
